Wary Killdeer

Most of the birds, when my truck approached where they were feeding, would swim or fly away. This killdeer stayed where it was and watched me carefully. I didn't know anything about these birds until last year. A couple of killdeer laid their eggs in the garden we have at school on the ground. After laying their eggs, they will protect the eggs until the little ones hatch. If they think your are a danger to their eggs, the birds will make a distressed call and pretend that they had a broken wing and can't move well. The idea is that you will follow the bird and get away from the nest.

 

I showed my students some youtube videos of them doing this crazy dance last year to show them why they were doing it at school. It gave my kids more buy in to protect them. At recess time, there were always kids out there to protect them after that. One day we came out and they were gone. One egg didn't make it and I showed it to the kids. It was a great learning experience and connection to nature for the kids.

Done